Carpenter hoping to retain Newgarden services in 2017

Ed Carpenter is hoping Josef Newgarden continues with his team amid rumours that both Team Penske and Chip Ganassi Racing are after his signature to race for them in 2017.

Newgarden has been impressive driving for Ed Carpenter Racing this year, winning in dominant fashion at Iowa Speedway, and Carpenter is eager to retain his services at least for another season, and hopes they would be able to make another step forward should the partnership continue.

“We’ve started the process of talking about next year,” said Carpenter to Motorsport.com. “I think we’ve done a good job and will continue to do a good job and get better as we have every year so far.

“Where Josef is going is next year is a topic that’s getting a lot of talk but we’re doing everything we can do to make a good offer to him and make a good case for him staying here.

“Ultimately you can’t control exactly how it’s going to play out and obviously there’s a lot of unknowns. So we’re just gonna have to do what we do and play the game and see how it all shakes out.”

Carpenter revealed that he has been in discussion with Newgarden about 2017 and hopes a decision can be reached soon about his future, but is delighted that he continues to show his potential on track.

“I can’t speak for Josef, but from my point of view he’s continuing to do a good job,” said Carpenter. “And from the way we’re dealing with it, along with the rest of his [management] group, I don’t feel like there’s much pressure.

“We’ve had good conversations, we know where each other is on everything and we’ll go through the rest of the process and hopefully have an answer to the whole issue sooner rather than later. But it’s no different from how it was last year, to be honest.

“But it’s one of those situations where we’ll focus on getting something done with Josef until I know that’s done one way or the other. If he decides to move on, then we’ll look at our options but he is Plan A. And it’s hard to work on Plan B until we know what happens with Plan A.”